importin
Sign in to saveImportin is a type of karyopherin involved in the nuclear transport of moving protein molecules from a cell's cytoplasm to the nucleus. It does so by binding to specific recognition sequences, called nuclear localization sequences (NLS).
Key facts
- Protein.Arm
- q
- Protein.Band
- 21.1
- Protein.name
- Importin subunit beta-1
- Protein.Symbol
- KPNB1
- Protein.EntrezGene
- 3837
- Protein.HGNCid
- 6400
- Protein.OMIM
- 602738
- Protein.RefSeq
- NP_002256
- Protein.UniProt
- Q14974
- Protein.Chromosome
- 17
via Wikipedia infobox
~10 min read
Article
15 sectionsContents
- Discovery
- Structure
- Importin-α
- Importin-β
- Nuclear protein import cycle
- Cargo binding
- Cargo transport
- Cargo release
- Recycling
- Neuronal functions
- Disease
- Types of cargo
- Human importin genes
- References
- External links
Importin is a type of karyopherin involved in the nuclear transport of moving protein molecules from a cell's cytoplasm to the nucleus. It does so by binding to specific recognition sequences, called nuclear localization sequences (NLS).
Importin has two subunits, importin α and importin β. Members of the importin-β family can bind and transport cargo by themselves, or can form heterodimers with importin-α. As part of a heterodimer, importin-β mediates interactions with the pore complex, while importin-α acts as an adaptor protein to bind the nuclear localization signal (NLS) on the cargo. The NLS-Importin α-Importin β trimer dissociates after binding to Ran GTP inside the nucleus, with the two importin proteins being recycled to the cytoplasm for further use.